What a pleasure to find an absorbing read to usher in summer vacation and to keep me busy as we prep for a two week trip away! Lost Art is a charming, involving, cheerful nothing of a book--reminds me a LOT of "I Capture The Castle" but is much more developed. Would love to read a sequel/more of her writing. Highly recommended for Anglophiles and/or historical fiction buffs: it's set in post WWII England, a time period I haven't read much about.

Thursday, June 25, 2015

We are on vacation! Though I was done 4 days earlier than last year and missed one of the two Saturday makeup days, it was still a long and demanding year on many levels. On Saturday, June 20, my two ninth grade classes had exams, so Sunday (which was also Confirmation Sunday at church, and I was a mentor) was mostly correcting and doing grades, and then Monday, June 22 was "Tie Up Loose Ends and Clean" Day, and then Tuesday I had Learning Area Leaders frm 8:30 - 11 and then. . . my beloved husband and I headed out to Brownfield, Maine and the Stone Mountain Arts Center to see this guy:

Keb' Mo', June 23, 2015

and spend the night at this place:

The Inn at Crystal Lake, Eaton, NH.

and generally enjoy ourselves. We ambled back across the state the long way, and got home yesterday afternoon. . . and we leave for our Scandinavian trip on Monday! Today was my first chance to sleep as late as I wanted (7:55 am, thank you very much!) and sit with my coffee and the pets out on the patio. Hello, summer. I've been waiting.

Sunday, June 14, 2015

I've been super busy these few weeks, but I also found Operation Mincemeat a fairly slow read. It got rave reviews from my sister and my husband, but I realized, once I finished it (yesterday) that I found it interesting but ponderous. There were so many details, and so many layers of deception and spies and counter spies and what exactly is a double agent, anyway?. . . . that it took considerable concentration to get through the story, fascinating as the plot is.

Summer has finally arrived, according to the weather, but we have another week of school left, so my time has been short. Between various arrivals, departures, a somewhat-more-intense-than-normal Pilgrim Lodge weekend, the Library's Rainbow Readers' Race, etc., etc., my go-to "reads" have been audiobooks! Still, that will change soon.